Winter Solstice and Child Mind
Shambhala Buddhism’s religious year relies on a lunisolar calendar, meaning that our celebration days depend on both phases of the moon and stations of the sun. We call these Nyida Days, from the Tibetan words for Sun and Moon, and they include four seasonal celebrations that mark the solstice and equinox days. Our Winter Solstice festival is Children’s Day – and time when we celebrate the dignity of the family, the joy and creativity of youthful hearts, and the magic of play and the senses. Because the solstice marks the time of year when the night is longest and daylight has waned, light is a special characteristic of this holiday.
You can celebrate Winter Solstice with twilight walks and winter star gazing, by greeting the Great Eastern Sun at midwinter sunrise, by making an offering of juniper incense, and by decorating your home with things that engage and delight your senses: Fresh juniper branches hung with dried orange slices, whole cinnamon sticks, delicate lights, and tinkling bells, or wind-chimes hung in your windows, on your balcony, or from the branches of trees in your yard. Light candles (butter candles, beeswax, or scented with something like pine, cloves, or vanilla). Share desserts like Sikarni, Carrot Cake, and Khapse cookies, savoury treats like curry-spiced cashews, and dumplings with chutney, and delicious drinks like hot chocolate and Friendship Tea (green or black tea flavoured with orange and lemon peel, whole cranberries, cloves, cinnamon, and cardemom pods, and sweetened with honey). Build a snow fort, make paper snowflakes, take a walk in the woods and listen for the voices of chickadees, cardinals, wood peckers, and blue jays. Dress up in costumes – who will be Queen of Shambhala? Who will be a perky Snow Lion? An inscrutable Dragon? – and paper crowns. Risk making crafts featuring glitter.
We celebrate the Winter Solstice with glitttering lights, colourful crafts, our most flavourful and delighting foods, and stories about the Kingdom of Shambhala – like Iliana: A Winter Solstice Tale and, above all, with play. Shambhala’s Winter Solstice celebration is a time to lighten up, despite the darkness, to ignore the constant hammering of “Grow up! Stop acting like a child!” and connect with Child Mind, Beginner Mind, through joyful play.
How will you take time to play this year?
